Winter Swans by Owen Sheers – Poem Analysis

nature is a common composition seen throughout poetry. It feels like the majority of poets, at some degree or the other, will use the natural worldly concern as a metaphorical mean of expression. possibly it ’ south because the natural universe is something many poets aspire to harmonize with, or possibly it ’ s the fact that a significant range of human emotions can be expressed through natural phenomena. Take, for exemplify, the title concept of Owen Sheers ’ s Winter Swans. On its own, this is a strike double, pairing white with white and beautiful with beautiful ( unless you associate winter with dark nights, acerb cold, and direction besides much wind, in which shell it ’ s a stun contrast ). In nature, Owen finds a entail of expressing an estimate using alone, fresh words that give his work a sense of originality and a sense of the author ’ s own perspective, which is needed in any art form that wants to stand out and truly say something .

Winter Swans Analysis

Stanza One

The defile had given their all –
( … )
in which we walked ,

The poem, which can be read in full here, begins in the style that persists throughout — verses are three lines long and neither rhyme nor adhere to particular syllable counts. This beginning poetry introduces two narrators for the poem, speaking with the pronoun “ we ” as a mean of suggesting that the two individuals are of one beware, and are both speaking through this poem.

Without using peculiarly difficult lyric to decipher, the speakers explain that they have been spending their time walking in the rain. There is a cagey use of personification of the mottle in the first tune ; a cloud, of course, can not put campaign into anything, but by suggesting the clouds are giving the process of rain “ their all, ” the narrator uses companion lyric to suggest that it has been raining identical heavily .
besides of interest is the structure of the poem that does not identify verses from sentences. Where the channel breaks throughout the poem to be deleted, the poem would read as grammatically correct were it merely a collection of three sentences. They would, however, be run-on sentences, and it is the breaking up of their contents into this format that makes the poem clear and far more interest than plainly being a few sentences .

Stanza Two

the boggy earth
( … )
as we skirted the lake, mum and apart ,

The personification continues into the next verse ; the earth beneath the feet of the walk match is “ gulping for breath, ” suggesting that it is opened, easy, and sinks beneath the steps of the couple. We are besides given a morsel of scenery — there is a lake the copulate is walking approximately, and they are neither talking nor are they together, suggesting possibly they are lost in their own thoughts or feel separate from one another emotionally .

Stanza Three

until the swans came and stopped us
( … )

Again continuing from the last sentence, this verse is able to start with the give voice “ until, ” an effective way to begin a verse. This verse describes the appearance of two swans who temporarily halt the motion of the couple, who stop to watch them dive beneath the lake in unison. Using a simile, the speaker suggests the apparent motion is as though the swans are trying to roll something down their backs, so smooth is the motion of the diving .

Stanza Four

they halved themselves in the iniquity water,
( … )

The following verse begins with an matter to use of metaphor — the swans “ halved ” themselves, which is a potent give voice with two meanings. On a actual level, the two swans were presumably swimming side by side, and when they dove, it became easier to tell that there were two swans swimming together because it appeared as though the shape had been split in half. With regards to the root of togetherness therefore far presented by this poem, it suggests that the two swans are akin to soulmates ; that they were the picture of one single entity because they belonged together, and that diving necessitate splitting themselves in half to be individual creatures once more. The lie of the verse is dedicated to the imagination of peace ; describing the birds as being crisphead lettuce of egg white feather in roughly waters is portraying them as being the prototype of peace, of stability ( or why else does one practice a gravy boat ? ) in a wintry, pugnacious, challenging world.

Stanzas Five to Seven

‘ They mate for life ’ you said as they left,
porcelain over the still water. I didn ’ thyroxine reply
( … )
like a pair of wings settling after fledge

The remainder of the poem brings the root of togetherness to the vanguard of its attention. Earlier, the couple was described as being both dumb and apart ; in the third-to-last verse, the other person, who is not the narrator, speaks for the inaugural meter, telling the other person that swans, unlike many natural creatures, mate for life, taking only one collaborator. She says this as the swans leave. They are alike porcelain ; beautiful and valuable, and the water is now calm and distillery. At this degree, the pair ’ mho hands meet. The habit of the metaphor of the hands “ swimming the distance ” is a hard mention to the swans from before and is about a revoke of the personify of natural elements from earlier. This time it is the humans who are becoming a little more like the natural populace and coming close together in appreciation of its beauty .
Throughout Winter Swans, Sheers makes very little distinction between the natural populace and the world of humans. The human couple is inspired by two swans swimming across a lake ; at the lapp meter, the overcast in the flip are putting in the feat to rain down a hard as they can. personification is one of the principal devices used in this poem, but it works both ways, as though the generator is trying to say that humans and nature are alike in more than one way .
The idea of “ winter ” is never in truth brought into the poem, except through the upwind ; the changeless rain, and the metaphor of the swans as boats in a stormy ocean. Whether or not it is literally winter in the plant of the poem is unmanageable to say ; what is easier to determine is that the theme of “ winter swans ” is strange, because swans are migrant creatures, preferring mild climates to cold ones. The title image is exchangeable to the in-poem metaphor of the swans as boats, as signs of constancy and peace in roughly times. possibly this is besides an apposite description for the copulate in the poem, who needed a sign of stability to be able to drift closer to one another, in the midst of stormy weather, and possibly crude times ampere well .
The abstract nature of the poem makes it unmanageable to say for sure, but thematically, it hits its marker, striking the ideas of togetherness and of nature in a potent, imagist way that truly renders the ideas in Sheers ’ mho mind well.

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source : https://unianimal.com
Category : Birds